I forcement of eighteen at tea and cards, may, believe, be called a small party, which a lady may attend without any assistance from the hair-dresser. There is one maxim never to be departed from; namely, that the smallness of the house is no objection to the largeness of the party. The reason is, that, as these meetings are chiefly holden in the winter, the company may keep one another warm. But this will not, in every instance, be the case, after all the care and pains upon earth. For, when the other apartments were full, I have known four persons shut into a closet at Christmas, without fire or candle, playing a rubber by the light of a sepulchral lamp, suspended from the ceiling. At another time, the butler, opening a cupboard to take out the apparatus for the lemonade, with the nice decanters to prevent mischief in case of weak stomachs, found two little misses, whom the lady of the house, ever anxious to promote the happiness of all her friends, had squeezed and pinioned in there, to form a snug party at cribbage. An accident happened, last winter, at one of these amicable associations, from a contrary cause, where the fluids in the human frame had suffered too great a degree of rarefaction. A gentleman, making a precipitate retreat, on finding himself inflated, like a balloon, with a large dose of gas, or burnt air in him, tumbled over a card table, which (that no room might be lost) had been set upon a landing-place of the stairs. The party, with all the implements of trade, table, cards, candle, and counters, and the unfortunate person who had brought on the catastrophe, rolled down together. No farther mischief, however, was done; and two gentlemen of the party, as I have been well informed, found time to make a bet on the odd trick before they got to the bottom. But these are trifling circumstances, and no more than may be expected to fall to the lot of humanity. I do not mention them, I am sure, as constituting any objection to a party, or as affording any reason why one should deprive one's-self of the pleasure one always has in see, ing one's friends about one. THE OLLA PODRIDA, No. 9, May 12, 1787. No. CXVIII. Si non ingentem foribus domus alta superbis Manè salutantum totis vomit ædibus undam At secura quies. VIRGIL. Though nor high domes, through all their portals wide, SOTHEBY. I MADE an entrance, in my last paper, on the important subject of visiting, and distinguished the different kinds of visits now in vogue amongst us, with their excellencies and defects. It is hard, indeed, to guess at the pleasure of assembling in very large parties. There is much heat, hurry, and fatigue, to all who are concerned. The essence of the entertainment seems to consist in a crowd, and none appear to be perfectly happy while they can stir hand or foot. At least, this is the case with the lady of the house, whose supreme felicity it is, to be kept in equilibrio by an equilateral pressure from all quarters. Fixed in her orb, like the sun of the system, she dispenses the favour of her nods and smiles on those bodies, which-I which I could say-move around her; but that they cannot do. But though pleasure be not obtained, trouble, perhaps, it may be said, is saved, by receiving a multitude at once, instead of being subject to their perpetual incursions in separate bodies; and when the polite mob has been at my house I am at rest for some time.-True: but then there is a reciprocity; and as others have assisted in making your mob a decent and respectable one, you must do the same by them, and every evening will pass in this rondeau of delights; a vortex, out of which none can emerge, and into which more and more are continually drawn, for fear of being left in solitude; as all who wish to visit will very soon be obliged to visit after this method, or not at all. From the metropolis the fashion has made its way into provincial towns, all the visitable inhabitants of which will be assembled together at one house or other through the winter; and this, though perhaps there is not a single person among them, who does not dislike and complain of the cus tom, as absurd and disagreeable. For the conduct of these visits no directions can be laid down; but concerning others (while any such shall remain) where a moderate company of neighbours meet, to pass a little. time in conversation, some observations may be offered. They are useful, and, indeed, necessary, to maintain a friendly and social intercourse, without which we are not in a capacity to give or receive help and assistance from each other. They are useful to cheer and refresh the spirits after business, and may render us fitter to return to it again. They are useful, when they are made with a view of relieving and comforting such as are afflicted or distressed; and that, not only in great and signal troubles, but the common cares and concerns of life; of advising, exhorting, and consoling such as, having weak and low spirits, are oppressed by anxiety and melancholy; of which in England the number always has been, and always will be, very considerable. Time is well employed in these and the like good offices, where a friend is the best physician. The very sight of a cheerful friend is often like the sun breaking forth in a cloudy day. A melancholy person is at least as much the object of charity as a sick one. The cheerful owe this duty to those who are otherwise; and enjoy, themselves, the most refined and exalted kind of pleasure, when they find their endeavours succeed. Visits are useful, when they become the means of acquiring or communicating useful knowledge, relative to the conduct of life, in |